Shortly after Kaius left Guelph’s defensive perimeter to deal with Devourer, Lieutenant Saunders ordered his men to stop using their grenades and switch back to their automatic rifles.

Countless bullets rained down on the zombie horde. Numerous zombie corpses stacked on top of one another, forming a small mound near the entrance to the city. The soldiers had already killed over two hundred zombies and were approaching the three hundred mark quickly.

Roar!

From within the zombie horde, Bruiser let out a deafening bellow. It no longer walked on pace with the regular zombies, instead, it charged out from within the horde.

“Focus fire on that thing!” Lieutenant Saunders commanded.

Immediately, ten automatic rifles switched their aims and shot at Bruiser.

Grrrrrroowwwllll!

Bruiser snarled as it got hit by dozens of bullets. Although the bullets found their mark, each bullet was only able to penetrate half a centimeter deep, leaving behind shallow wounds.

Getting annoyed by the pesky bullets, Bruiser jumped off the highway and grabbed an abandoned car off the road with both of its hands. Bruiser’s muscles bulged as it lifted the car up and hurled it at a watchtower.

“Oh shi–”

The three soldiers on the watchtower quickly tried to jump out.

“Aah!!” Two soldiers twisted their ankles when they fell off and let out painful cries.

The third soldier didn’t move fast enough and got crushed by the car.

“Smith and Miller are down,” Lieutenant Saunders spoke into the radio. “Johnson, have your men pull Smith and Miller out of there. Williams, have your team provide cover.”

“Roger.”

“Copy. Permission to use grenade?”

“Permission granted.”

On the rooftop of a local clinic, one of the soldiers from Williams’ team took out a grenade and pulled out the pin. Right as he was about to throw it, he saw a shadow flash by from the corner of his eye. In the next moment, his vision started spinning as though the world had turned upside down. When his vision finally stabilized, he was shocked to see a view of his headless body!

Blood squirted out from his neck. The live grenade in his hand fell to the ground and rolled into the middle of his team.

Boom!

“Williams, what the hell happened?” Lieutenant Saunders shouted over the radio. After a few seconds of no response, he shouted again. “Somebody respond! Damn it!”

A severely wounded Williams knelt on the ground and struggled to reach for his radio with his trembling hands.

Puchi!

Williams stared down in disbelief at the sharp long claw that penetrated through his chest from behind. Turning his head, he saw the smug, ugly face of the evolved zombie Flicker.

Slash!

Flicker sliced off Williams’ head cleanly. Retracting its claws, Flicker flung Williams’ headless body away like a ragdoll and disappeared off the side of the building.

Over at the city entrance, Bruiser continued to hurl abandoned cars at the soldiers on the rooftops. Several soldiers got injured, but luckily no one had died.

Clang!

An abandoned car crashed into the metal fence and flattened it. The regular zombies finally managed to break through the defensive perimeter from this gap.

Zombies poured into the city like water bursting out from a broken dam.

“Shit! Everyone, retreat to point Delta,” Lieutenant Saunders commanded over the radio.

Every soldier promptly began their tactical retreat.

Because Johnson’s team had to carry the wounded Smith and Miller, they were a step slower than the rest. As they got onto Woolwich Street, a large shadow flew past and landed heavily on the ground a dozen meters in front of them.

Bruiser had jumped down from a building and blocked their way. While the soldiers were still in shock at its sudden appearance, Bruiser grabbed a nearby abandoned car and flung it at the soldiers.

“Dodge!”

Splat!

Smith and Miller couldn’t move fast enough due to their ankle injury and were directly crushed into meat paste.

Seeing their fellow soldiers die in front of them, Johnson’s team unloaded all their firepower like madmen at Bruiser without holding back. Dozens of bullets rained down every second. One of the soldiers pulled out the pin from a grenade and tossed it at Bruiser.

Boom!

The explosion sent Bruiser flying back a meter. The shrapnel caused long gashes on its legs, hampering its mobility.

Seeing that grenades are effective, another soldier took out his grenade. Right as he was about to pull the pin out, a sharp long claw penetrated his skull from the back and shredded his brain into mush. He didn’t even get a chance to know how he died.

Johnson caught sight of the brutal killing from the corner of his eye and shouted in horror, “Flicker!”

The remaining soldiers turned towards Flicker’s direction and unleashed their bullets. However, Flicker quickly retreated into a nearby building.

Over on the other side of the street, Bruiser had recovered from the grenade explosion and charged at the soldiers while they were momentarily distracted by Flicker.

Bruiser crossed a dozen meters in a couple of seconds and swung its huge fists down at the closest soldier.

“Ahhhh!”

The unfortunate soldier tried to block the attack, but the overwhelming difference in strength made his block attempt seem as brittle as a dried twig. Bruiser’s fist smashed down at the soldier and flattened his head on the pavement. Brain matter splattered all over the ground.

As soon as the solders’ attention shifted back to Bruiser, Flicker once again appeared like the grim reaper and harvested the life of another soldier.

Now it was only Johnson left.

Seeing the hopeless situation, Johnson gritted his teeth and hardened his resolve. He charged at Bruiser while firing nonstop from his automatic rifle.

Click. Click. Click.

The automatic rifle stopped firing. Johnson had emptied his final rifle magazine.

Johnson pulled out the pins from his two remaining grenades in his belt and continued to charge at Bruiser.

Lesser Strength Enhance!

Lesser Dexterity Enhance!

Johnson burst forth with incredible strength and speed and grabbed hold of Bruiser’s waist tightly.

Bruiser smashed down at Johnson’s body, breaking his spine, and caused guts and blood to splatter out from his torso. Through sheer will, Johnson held onto Bruiser with his dying breath.

Boom!

A huge explosion engulfed Bruiser.

One kilometer southeast of the explosion, Lieutenant Saunders led the remaining soldiers down Woolwich Street and ran towards the city center. They planned on making their final defense line there.

After running for about 15 minutes, they had finally reached the city center.

“Jackson, your team will support me in luring the evolved zombies. The rest of you, scatter and focus on the regular zombies,” Lieutenant Saunders commanded.

Everyone quickly got into position. After waiting for a while, the zombie horde finally arrived.

Lieutenant Saunders and Jackson’s team stood out in the open on Woolwich Street as bait, while the rest of the soldier hid behind different buildings.

Lieutenant Saunders quickly checked his status again, as though to reassure himself.

Name

Robert Saunders

Class

Guardian

Level

20

Health

Normal

Mana

100/100

Strength

45

Vitality

44

Dexterity

36

Intelligence

11

Skills (active)

General

Intermediate Strength Enhance (25MP): temporarily increases Strength by 9. Duration: 30 minutes.

Intermediate Dexterity Enhance (25MP): temporarily increases Dexterity by 9. Duration: 30 minutes.

Guardian

Shield Wall (15MP): create a translucent wall-shaped barrier in front of the caster. Barrier is two meters tall, three meters wide, and five centimeters thick. Barrier thickness increases if caster is wielding a shield before casting. Duration: 10 minutes.

Inner Vitality (20MP): increase caster’s vitality by 6, plus an additional amount depending on the damage suffered in the next 15 minutes. Vitality increase duration: 30 minutes.

When the zombie horde got closer, bullets rained down on them from every nearby building. Dozens of regular zombies fell in the first round of firing.

Instead of being happy, Lieutenant Saunders frowned deeply at the scene, “where are the evolved zombies?”

As the soldiers continued to shoot at the zombie horde, Lieutenant Saunders gradually noticed that something was off. Some soldiers had stopped firing from certain buildings.

“Bukowski’s team, report your status,” Lieutenant shouted into his radio.

Only silence came back through the radio.

“Damn it! Flicker must have got to them. All of you, stop firing and retreat quickly.” Lieutenant Saunders then turned to Jackson’s team beside him, “throw out some grenades at the zombie horde and lure it out. We need to have its attention on us.”

Boom! Boom!

Grenades landed in the middle of the zombie horde and blasted dozens of zombies into pieces.

Lieutenant Saunders and Jackson’s team continued to shoot while retreating.

Out of the corner of his eye, Lieutenant Saunders caught sight of a shadow flying towards them.

Guardian Class skill, Shield Wall!

A large iron shield materialized in Lieutenant Saunders’ right hand. Holding it up high, thick mana surged into the shield then expanded out, forming a translucent wall-shaped barrier.

Bang!

Flicker’s sharp, long claws clashed against the barrier. Cracks quickly began to form on the barrier as Flicker pressed down with all its strength.

Sweat poured down on Lieutenant Saunders’ forehead as he tried to keep the barrier up.

Intermediate Strength Enhance!

Guardian Class skill, Inner Vitality!

Fierce red and blue auras surged out from Lieutenant Saunders and intertwined each other. He felt an immense power coursing through every inch of his body.

Feeling the boost in strength and vitality, Lieutenant Saunders managed to keep his barrier up for the time being.

Off to the side, Jackson’s team also reacted quickly and shot at Flicker. Instead of being worried, Flicker simply let out an ugly smile and contracted its muscles.

Stomping down hard on the ground, Flick suddenly disappeared right in front of everyone’s eyes. All the bullets passed through Flicker’s afterimage harmlessly.

Before anyone could react, Flicker somehow appeared behind Jackson’s team.

Slash! Slash!

Several heads flew into the air as Flicker slashed at multiple soldiers in a flurry of attacks.

“Behind–”

Jackson could only shout out one word before the world started to spin in front of him.

Slash!

Flicker weaved through the battlefield and decapitated the heads of every soldier in Jackson’s team like a ruthless grim reaper.

“Is that its innate skill?” Lieutenant Saunders was horror-struck at the sudden death of Jackson’s team. In a final desperate attempt, he decided to take a gamble and activated a skill.

Intermediate Dexterity Enhance!

Receiving a boost to his dexterity stat, Lieutenant Saunders held up his shield and ran as fast as he could towards the local police station.

A blurry shadow chased him relentlessly.

Slash! Slash!

Lieutenant Saunders tried to block the fierce attacks from Flicker, but deep gashes still appeared on his body one after the other. In a matter of seconds, his body was already covered in bloody wounds.

Clang!

Lieutenant Saunders finally reached the police station and crashed through the front glass doors. Broken glass shards scattered everywhere. Rolling forward into the narrow hallway, Lieutenant Saunders did a quick turnabout and raised his shield up.

Bang!

Flicker knocked into Lieutenant Saunders violently and sent him flying backwards.

Gasping for breath, Lieutenant Saunders shouted, “Lucas, now!”

A few meters behind Lieutenant Saunders, Lucas popped up from under the front desk counter. With a resolute gaze in his eyes, he steadied his stance and raised up a rocket launcher onto his shoulders. He knew that if the rocket exploded in this confined space, both he and Lieutenant Saunders would most likely perish. His only hope was that they could drag Flicker down with them.

Pressing the trigger, a 60mm rocket shot out from within the launcher and propelled towards Flicker.

Seeing the dangerous object flying towards it, Flicker tried to turn around and escape out front doors.

Bang!

Flicker ran into an unexpected translucent barrier and stumbled backwards half a step. Inside the narrow hallway, its only exit was blocked off by the barrier.

Lieutenant Saunders had used up his remaining mana to cast Shield Wall one more time.

Seeing the exit blocked, Flicker quickly contracted its muscles and stomped hard on the ground. It left an afterimage in its original spot and vanished in front of everyone’s eyes.

As though expecting this, Lieutenant Saunders mustered up the last bits of his strength and charged forward.

Inside the narrow hallway, Flicker reappeared and crashed into Lieutenant Saunders’ iron shield. Its right claw penetrated the shield and became stuck in it. However, this time, Lieutenant Saunders did not get knocked back and barely held his ground. With all the wounds inflicted by Flicker previously, Lieutenant Saunders’ vitality stat increased by a tremendous amount because of the Inner Vitality skill.

Not letting up, Lieutenant Saunders shoved forward with all his strength. He only needed to block Flicker for another half second and the rocket would hit the ground behind Flicker and explode.

Sensing the impending doom, Flicker jumped up diagonally with its powerful legs, sidestepped off the wall to its left, and landed behind Lieutenant Saunders. Without giving him a chance to react, Flicker plunged its left claw straight through his heart.

Puchi!

Blood poured out of Lieutenant Saunders’ mouth. In his final moment, he saw the rocket finally hit the ground. Bright light from the rocket’s explosion engulfed his vision.

Boom!

The police station was blown apart in a fiery explosion.

Back on Highway 6, Kaius was quickly making his way back to the city. Along the way, he controlled all the stray zombies that he came across and summoned skeleton warriors from all the zombie corpses. Thanks to the mana cost reductions from his two passive skills, he was able to fully replenish his undead army. He decided to dismiss them back to the Netherworld since their speed wouldn’t be able to keep up with him.

Running past the city entrance, the sight of a ruined city came into view. Countless zombie corpses piled up around the city entrance. A large section of the metal fence had been toppled. Several of the nearby buildings were either half destroyed or on fire.

Past the city entrance, dozens of zombies wandered aimlessly around, searching for their next meal.

Kaius materialized the Basic Sword in his hand and rushed forward.

Several zombies noticed Kaius and marched towards him. Kaius swung his sword and easily decapitated the heads of two zombies in one fell swoop. Before the headless zombies slumped to the ground, Kaius had already moved onto the next zombie and chopped its head off.

All the commotion from fighting attracted the attention of more zombies.

Unfazed, Kaius weaved around the battlefield like a silent killer. Every swing of his sword caused a zombie to fall to the ground. In just two short minutes, Kaius cleaned up every zombie in the vicinity.

Running down Woolwich Street, Kaius came across several solders’ dead bodies. He stopped for a second to quickly identify the bodies.

Suddenly, a car hurled towards Kaius. With his quick reaction, he managed to dodge to the side. The car crashed into the soldiers’ corpses and turned them into mush. Turning his head to look down the street, Kaius saw an injured Bruiser reaching for another car to toss.

Eye of mana!

Name

Bruiser

Class

Rank 1 Evolved Zombie

Level

20

Health

Severely Injured

Mana

20/20

Strength

65 (-15)

Vitality

49 (-31)

Dexterity

18 (-12)

Intelligence

7 (-3)

“Its attributes have fallen to such an extent?” Kaius was pleasantly surprised.

Looking at Bruiser closer, Kaius saw that its inner thighs were missing a huge chunk of flesh. Its abdomen was a bloody mess, with only a thin layer of skin keeping its innards intact.

Kaius dodged another car that was hurled towards him and rushed at Bruiser.

Vital Break!

Dark, corrosive energy coated the Basic Sword, giving it a cold, malevolent aura.

Seeing Kaius arrive in front of it, Bruiser struck out with its gigantic right fist. Kaius utilized his high agility and sidestepped to the left. He immediately countered with a quick slash to Bruiser’s abdomen, wanting to rip open its final thin layer of skin.

Bruiser managed to block the slash with its left arm, letting the sword leave a long gash on its forearm. A thread of dark energy lingered on the open wound.

Taking advantage of Bruiser’s decreased dexterity stat, Kaius danced around Bruiser, leaving slash wounds on every inch of its body.

Bruiser could only helplessly flail around, trying to hit Kaius. In a matter of minutes, Kaius had already left over thirty cuts.

Thanks to the effects of Corrosive Coating, each cut further decreased Bruiser’s vitality down to a measly 19.

Kaius once again slashed at Bruiser’s abdomen. It tried to block the attack, but Kaius’ slash was merely a faint. He stopped his slash halfway and instead aimed his left hand at Bruiser’s abdomen from another angle.

Shadow Bolt!

Pop!

Various intestines and organs exploded out from Bruiser’s abdomen and splattered all over the ground.

“Arrrrggggghhhh!”

Bruiser let out a painful yell and fell to its knees. It used one hand to support itself from falling over, while its other hand covered its abdomen. It slowly raised its head, glaring at Kaius with hopelessness and hatred.

“Just a mere zombie, how dare you show human expressions.”

Kaius raised his sword high up and slashed down. With Bruiser’s pitifully low vitality stat, Kaius’ sword easily sliced through its neck. Its decapitated body finally collapsed to the ground.

[Level up!]

[3 attribute points acquired.]

[1 additional attribute point acquired due to Nether Physique.]

[Intelligence increased by 5 due to Nether Physique.]

[2 additional attribute points acquired due to Favor of the Nether God.]

[Level up!]

[3 attribute points acquired.]

[1 additional attribute point acquired due to Nether Physique.]

[Intelligence increased by 5 due to Nether Physique.]

[2 additional attribute points acquired due to Favor of the Nether God.]

Thinking of the remaining evolved zombie Flicker, Kaius put all attribute points into dexterity, hoping to raise his speed a bit.

Two orbs of white light floated above Bruiser’s body. One of them was 478 System Coins. The other one was an equipment.

Name

Leather Vambrace

Category

Arm Guard

Class Use Restriction

None

Strength

+3

Vitality

+1

Description

A sturdy arm guard made of special leather.

Skills (active)

Focused Strike (10MP): increases strength by 9 for the next attack.

Kaius promptly collected the System Coins and wore the Leather Vambrace on his right arm. He stored Bruiser’s corpse inside Fay’s Ring as well.

After taking a quick look at his stats, Kaius headed further down Woolwich Street towards the police station.

Name

Kaius

Class

Nether Lord

Level

22

Health

Normal

Mana

2205/2205

Strength

63 (+3)

Vitality

52 (+4)

Dexterity

59

Intelligence

241 (+3)

Skills (active)

General

Eye of Mana (2MP): allows the caster to view more information on the target.

Dark Magic

Shadow Bolt (10MP): shoot out a bolt made up of nether energy in a straight line.

Corrosive Armor (30MP): wraps the caster in armor made up of corrosive nether energy, increasing Vitality by level *2, plus an additional (50% + level%) of base Vitality stat. When anyone except for the caster comes into contact with Corrosive Armor, deal initial nether damage plus additional damage over time. Consumes 10 mana per minute.

Corrosive Coating (50MP): imbues any System weapon with dark, corrosive energy. Each successful attack will decrease target’s vitality stat by 1. Can stack up to (20 + level / 2) times. Enchantment duration: 30 minutes. Stack duration: 3 minutes.

Necromancy

Summon Skeleton (20MP): summon a skeleton warrior from a nearby corpse. Max limit: 110.

Control Undead (35MP): takes control over any undead creature. If the undead creature is more powerful than the caster, spell may fail and caster will suffer backlash, entering into the Weakened State for 4 hours. Weakened State reduces all attributes by 70%. Max limit: 110.

Corpse Explosion (7MP): causes a nearby corpse to explode. Explosion strength increases proportional to the corpse’s vitality stat.

Netherworld

Bone Confiscation (50MP): forcefully rips out the skeletons from a living being and transforms the skeleton into a skeleton soldier. Attributes of the skeleton soldier is dependent on the attributes of the living being used. If the living being has higher intelligence attribute than the caster, spell may fail and caster will suffer backlash, entering into the Weakened State for 4 hours. Weakened State reduces all attributes by 70%. Max limit: 44.

Nether Lord’s Aura (100MP): decreases the base attributes of all non-controlled undead creatures within a (100 + level*5) meter radius by (5% + level/20%). Increases the base attributes of all controlled undead creatures within a (100 + level*5) meter radius by (5% + level/10%). Duration: 20minutes.

Nether Lord’s Blessing (200MP): able to embed a Nether Core inside a controlled undead creature, allowing them to grow stronger by consuming other living or undead creatures.

Skills (passive)

Mastery of Necromancy: as a being that has formerly reached the peak of necromancy, reduce the mana cost of all necromancy spells by 50%.

Mana Mastery: as a being that has formerly reached the peak of at least one type of magic, reduce the mana cost of all spells by 20%.

Nether Physique: as a result of successfully casting Nether Rebirth, Nether Physique has been acquired. Enhances the effects of all dark magic spells by 100%. Enhances the effects of all Necromancy spells by 200%. Possessor of the Nether Physique is immune to zombie virus. Increases resistance against dark magic by 20%. Increases mana pool by level * 100. Increases mana regeneration by 500%. Gain 5 additional Intelligence stat points and 1 additional attribute point per level up.

Favor of the Nether God: gained the favor of the God of the Netherworld due to possession of the Nether Physique. Increase experience gained by 100%. Gain 2 additional attribute points per level up.

Nether Link: a connection has been made to the Netherworld. Caster can dismiss undead creatures under their control to the Netherworld and resummon it anytime at half the mana cost. Increases effects of Netherworld spells by 100%. Increases resistance to all magic damage by 5%.

Resistance

Zombie Virus: 100%; Dark magic: 20%; All magic: 5%